You'll learn and apply the principles and elements related to graphic design and instructional technology!

You'll become familiar with the powerful "under the hood" features of Photoshop!

You'll have the opportunity for real world experiences, where you produce graphics that will be used on campus, or in local organizations and businesses!

This course will provide you the opportunity to gain more advanced knowledge of the graphic design process in relation to instructional technology. First, we'll focus on principles and elements of design, related to creating well designed instructional, PR and marketing materials. Second, we'll focus on the use of Adobe Photoshop to build and design those graphic projects.

​You'll be mastering a set of required skills, but you will have the opportunity to chart a course through those skills that will best fit the needs of your desired profession. The required skills build upon, and then go beyond those learned in the ITLS 5230/6230 Instructional Graphics Production 1 - Beginning Photoshop & Design course. This course will take you through the more powerful mechanisms "under the hood" that make Photoshop a premiere tool for graphics production.

Assignments will be project-based, real world experiences, and you will be evaluated on clean, convincing, and effective application of learned skills, use of design principles and elements, originality, and visual creativity.

You will come away from the class with a portfolio you can use in your job search after graduation. You will have the opportunity, through real-world projects, to have your work displayed on campus digital displays, or produced in print and used by the college or departments within the college.

Recipe Book Layout by Erica Miura, Student

What will you learn in this class?

Understand and apply principles of instructional and graphic design, color, and typography.

Review in depth the principles of contrast, repetition, alignment, proximity

Learn how to organize for the best visual perception, how to direct the eyes, how to reduce realism to get your message across quickly, how to make the abstract concrete, how to clarify complexity, and how to charge up emotions in images.

Understand how to use channels for masking, including the calculations and apply image commands

Use multiple ways to convert an image to black and white, and use this knowledge to enhance your color images

Create and use smart objects effectively, such as creating Photoshop templates

Use the full power of Camera Raw to manipulate and adjust images

Understand multiple ways to deal with noise and detail in images

Understand how and when to use the blending modes

Use Photoshop's 3D drawing and rendering tools

Use Photoshop's video editing tools

Digital Signage by Nathan Blaylock, student

UCET 2017 poster design by Dominic Bohne

RequiredTextVisual Language for Designers: Principles for Creating Graphics that People UnderstandWithin every picture is a hidden language that conveys a message, whether it is intended or not. This language is based on the ways people perceive and process visual information. By understanding visual language as the interface between a graphic and a viewer, designers and illustrators can learn to inform with accuracy and power.

Visual Language for Designers includes:

How to organize graphics for quick perception

How to direct the eyes to essential information

How to use visual shorthand for efficient communication

How to make abstract ideas concrete

How to best express visual complexity

How to charge a graphic with energy and emotion

Required SoftwareAdobe Photoshop Creative CloudYou need to have access to Photoshop Creative Cloud to take this course. It costs $9.99 per month for the photography plan (Photoshop & Lightroom - which includes Bridge, which is all you'll need for this course). If you're taking other courses that require other Adobe products, you may wish to purchase the monthly subscription to Adobe Creative Cloud at $19.99 per month for the entire design suite. If you are Utah State University faculty or staff, visit with me before buying any Adobe software; there are special deals for you.

Strongly recommended, but optional - Lynda.com Online LearningAlong with the textbook, I strongly recommend that you subscribe to Lynda.com. You will have access to this instruction from any internet connected device. Lynda.com's mobile site and iPhone and iPad app feature streaming video, plus your course history syncs across devices. You can learn at your own pace. You can review a piece of instruction as many times as you need to. The instruction is some of the best in the industry. I am certain you'll find this instruction much better than any textbook out there. Many of my former students told me they were so impressed with the site, they are going to continue their subscription to Lynda.com.

You may choose which plan you would like to subscribe to, but at a minimum you should purchase the monthly subscription ($25.00/month). This plan will give you access to all the Lynda.com content - which will provide access to all of their courses and thousands of tutorials. There are hundreds of Photoshop courses you can choose to learn from. You can continue your subscription for as long as you like, or stop the subscription at any time. I will link to instruction modules in each lesson to short Lynda.com training videos that will help you understand using Photoshop.

I have purchased a Lynda.com subscription that you may use in the Adele & Dale Education Technology Center (The YETC) - 170 Education Building on Logan Campus. One of my employees at the front desk will log you in if you ask them. However, only one person at a time is allowed to access it.

​Digital Storage Backup - Back up your files!Keeping a backup of your files somewhere other than your computer is a great habit to get into. I recommend that you keep a copy of your files on an external drive, a flash drive, and/or online file storage "clouds" such as Google Drive or Dropbox.com. Both provide free storage as well as higher quantities of storage space available to purchase. USU students who have set up an aggiemail.usu.edu account have unlimited storage provided through Google Drive. USU also offers students 50GB of free storage through Box.USU.edu. Just log in with your A-Number and strong password.

This was the required text for the ITLS 5230/6230 course - Beginning Photoshop and Graphic Design. If you're jumping into this course without having taken the pre-requisite course, then I'd strongly suggest purchasing this and reading through it. It's inexpensive, and a great read! A tried and true, easy-to-read guide to design terms and techniques from a "level 0" perspective. If your attitude is "I can't even draw a stick figure, how can I possibly design" then this is the book for you. This author's philosophy, introduced in the first few pages of the book, is that learning design can be simplified to 3 main steps:

Information Design Workbook: Graphic approaches, solutions, and inspiration + 30 case studies by Kim Baer​Opening with a very brief history followed by an instructive breakdown of the discipline, readers get an intimate understanding of the complexities of crafting information design to effectively improve communication both functionally and aesthetically. The back half of the book contains a wide range of case studies from design firms around the world so designers can see the techniques previously outlined in the first half of the book. The author also critiques and explains why the design is successful in terms of formal quality (Aesthetics) and function (How does it improve communication?).

Before and After magazine's focus on clarity, simplicity, and elegance has won it legions of fans--fans who will welcome this second volume of the definitive Before and After Page Design by John McWade. Truly an icon of the graphic design community, his insistence on approaching design not as mere decoration but as an essential form of communication is vividly apparent in this cohesive primer on page design and layout. And you could not hope for a better, more qualified teacher. McWade shows readers how to arrange and present information using today's powerful graphics tools. Readers will learn how to design single-page and multi-page documents, brochures, and ads; why one typeface works better than another; and much more. Best of all, they'll discover how to think visually transforming the images in their heads into something that communicates effectively on the page.

As the founder of the very first desktop publishing company (PageLab) and the publisher of Before and Aftermagazine, John McWade knows graphics. He also knows business–and the depth of that knowledge comes through in every page of this handsome primer on creating effective business graphics! In these pages, a master of the medium shows you how to use today's tools to create business graphics that communicate your business's identity in a variety of forms. From creating charts, graphs, calendars, and maps to designing newsletters, creating various types of stationery, coming up with an identity, using photos to convey a message, and creating gift certificates, Yellow Pages ads, coupons, forms, and more, this elegantly designed volume shows you how to present your business to the world graphically. Best of all, you'll discover how to think visually–ensuring that your perceptions of your business are the world's perception of your business through the effective use of business graphics.

Before and After magazine's focus on clarity and simplicity and its insistence on approaching design not as mere decoration but as an essential form of communication have won it legions of fans. If you're among them, you'll welcome the first book from B and A's founder and publisher. John McWade walks his own talk, bringing you a beautifully clear, cohesive, and elegant primer on page design. You'll learn by example how to design single-page and multi-page publications, brochures, and advertisements, applying the principles design professionals live by. You'll also learn how to choose the right font for your project, why one typeface works better than another, and lots more. Best of all, you'll discover how to think visually--transforming the images in your head into documents that communicate effectively on the page.

About This ClassThis course was developed specifically for a 15 week college semester and is currently being conducted as a blended face-to-face & online course for Utah State University students.